Month: January 2009

CVS error: server reported an error while performing the “cvs add” command. common: cvs server: [filename] added independently by second party.

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When trying to replace some old files in my local workspace, then commit the new ones to CVS, I got this error:

    The server reported an error while performing the “cvs commit” command. myproject: cvs server: failed to create lock directory for `/cvsrepositories/path_to/myproject’ (/cvsrepositories/path_to/myproject/subfolder/#cvs.lock): No such file or directory common: cvs server: lock failed – giving up myproject: cvs [server aborted]: lock failed – giving up – did not match any documents.

It turned out that the files had been previously stored in another CVS repository, with a different directory structure. Some of the directories still had CVS folders with pointers to the old repository directories and hostname.

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An Actionscript 3 Drag and Drop Medical Treasure Hunt Game

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This game is a framework to create a simulation of a crash cart in a hospital. A crash cart is a red metal tool cart with 6 drawers, filled with the items used by the Cardiac Arrest team to save people’s lives when they have a cardiac arrest. Speed is of the essence in an arrest, so the people on the team need to know exactly where each item is in the drawers. The goal of this game is to help train team members to find the items they need.

VIEW DEMO

An item to be found is randomly chosen, and the player clicks on a drawer and looks through the items to find the one they are looking for. When it is found, they drag the item to the target (which will probably be animated and a whole lot cooler looking in the final game. If they get it right, they get positive feedback of some sort and another item is chosen. If not, the item pops back to its last position before the drag and they get another chance to find the correct item.

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Drupal module Feed Aggregator escapes HTML tags in feeds

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Drupal’s Feed aggregator has a problem displaying some of the escaped tags in Google Alerts Feeds. For example, see the screenshot below:

Picture 31.jpeg

The fix is to alter the code in
modules/aggregator/aggregator.module

Search for

 function aggregator_save_item($edit)

In both the UPDATE statement and the INSERT statement:

replace $edit['title']

with 

strip_tags($edit['title'])
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The role of search in corporate learning programs

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Enterprise Search as Learning Technology

With the current training industry interest in elearning trends like informal learning, social and collaborative Web 2.0 learning technologies, it’s easy to overlook the importance of the humble search box as a learning tool.

More important now than ever

As companies seek to increase productivity with fewer people and resources, one way to improve efficiency is to create better connections between people and the information they need to do their jobs. It’s not hard to make big improvements in the search situation companies’ internal networks: the barriers that exist between knowledge workers and and information resources within company intranets are profound and economically significant. They fall into several categories:

  1. Information is hidden away in personal folders in documents that cannot be accessed through the web, and are not searched by a search engine.
  2. Web-based information that could have wider access is locked down to a small group of people.
  3. Information is available, but not located where people think to look for it.
  4. Information is available and can be searched but there are problems with the search engine’s judgement or display which prevent the user from finding it.
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Virtual Cardiac Arrest Cart Treasure Hunt game: Adapting the game to your needs

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A while back I wrote [LINK] about a treasure-hunt-style game we developed in-house for training purposes. The purpose of the game is to help healthcare professionals memorize the location of items stored within a cardiac arrest cart, to make things go smoothly when every second counts.

A cardiac arrest cart (or “crash cart”) is a red metal tool cabinet, filled with items like airway tubes, IV needles, masks and other supplies used in advanced cardiac life support. The goal of this game is to learn where all the items are by retrieving the requested item from the cart by opening drawers, then dragging the item to a target for checking.

VIEW DEMO of the Virtual Cardiac Arrest Cart

DOWNLOAD SOURCE files for the cart game.

Game play

  1. When the game loads, a cardiac arrest cart stands off to the left. A specific item is chosen at random and requested in a message toward the bottom of the screen.
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Drupal: Take back control of a folder from Drupal and password protecting it

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error.jpeg

By default, Drupal takes control of all subdirectories within its root folder. If Drupal resides within the web root of your site, you will not be able to get to any subdirectories that are non-Drupal related. Drupal will give a “Page Not Found” error on any page that doesn’t have Drupal content associated with it.

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Enable commenting in Adobe Reader, then use a PDF as a whiteboard

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Writing notes and sketching on PDF’s using a Tablet PC can be an excellent replacement for a blackboard or whiteboard in the classroom, meetings or lectures. Easier than using Powerpoint, especially when you want to improvise, it is particularly useful for annotating complex diagrams, music, mathematical problems, or anything requiring gridlines or graph paper.

On a Lenovo Tablet PC, you can use the clipping function to drop PDF’s into the Journal application and type or write on them with the pen. The pen has good enough resolution to write legibly, and draw lines and curves.

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